Review: Insieme

Insieme Ristorante

63 Flinders Street,

Adelaide SA 5000

8223 2777

http://www.insieme.net.au/ 

Open Breakfast to Lunch, Mon - Fri & Dinner on Fri

 

In the Adelaide CBD a chic, modern and bustling eatery is piled full of business people for a Tuesday lunch. Being a Tuesday, and being in Adelaide (no disrespect, I love this place) I was expecting that my brother and I would be sitting with only a handful of other diners. How wrong was I! Insieme Ristorante was jammed packed, it appears that the CBD workers know exactly where to eat. We were 10 minutes late for our reservation for my belated birthday lunch and our table was seemingly given away. Unfortunately we were left to wait standing for about 10mins until a table became available. However, once we assumed our position the service was excellent and the food and wine that were to follow were fabulous. We chose a bottle of Italian 2007 Peppoli Chianti Classico which again was a hit and after only a few minutes of breathing, was easy to drink and perfectly matched all our food. The complimentary, and in my opinion mandatory, bread and olive oil was divine, the oil was beautifully soft and almost buttery.

For entree we shared an antipasto plate which was presented very cleanly and consisted of olives, jamon, scallops, meatballs, squid, salad, and white anchovies. Needless to say in keeping with the restaurant the flavours were clean, concise and tasty. The scallops, wrapped in pancetta and seared to perfection were fabulous and the puree it was served on even better. The mini meatballs were absolutely sensational with a gorgeous tomato sauce that got completely mopped up. The small salad of rocket and red onion had a beautiful dressing which transformed it into a fighting contender among some starring elements. The white anchovies were succulent and flavoursome, the olives were nice and the squid and jamon were yummy. I was very happy.

For main I enjoyed a most delicious lamb fillet on sauteed spinach with a barolo (red wine) sauce and a twice cooked four cheese souffle ($34). This dish was superbly cooked and the flavours of the scented lamb, and the sauteed spinach brought together by the sweet borolo sauce was well balanced and completely delectable. The four cheese souffle was also extremely tasty and the oozing cheesy sauce really moistened it up. I did however question its place sitting on the plate with lamb and spinach as it seemed a little out of place. In saying that it tasted great so I shouldn't complain too much!

Unfortunately my brother took the step of ordering something he had never tried, rabbit (Coniglio Al Forno), and sadly it did not pay off. The rabbit ($34.50) came roasted and wrapped in pancetta with potatoes, peas and in unfancy terms, gravy. Although it was all well cooked, the meal essentially tasted and looked like a Sunday roast chic with gravy. This dish was worlds apart from the quality of what I was eating. For dessert we shared a chocolate torte with vanilla bean icecream and mixed berries. The size of the serve of the chocolate torte was a little small in my opinion, however it was fairly rich. The vanilla infused ice cream and berries in their thick couli-type sauce were the perfect accompaniment. Overall, very satisfying.

Insieme Ristorante has a good wine list with some great Italian as well as a few local varieties. I highly recommend trying the Pippoli Chianti Classico. All the other meals on the menu looked very appealing and I no doubt had a hard time when it came to deciding (this is a good thing!). The food and wine is on the expensive side but people are obviously happy paying for the food as the restaurant is very successful and I for one would be happy to come back again soon. Insieme Ristorante is well worth a visit for lunch or a Friday night dinner if you're in the city. You'll just have to contend with the suits to fight it out for a table..... Book ahead.

The Eatery by CK

Review: Pinocchio Ristorante.... Giuseppe would not be happy

Pinocchio Ristorante
50 Unley Road
Unley SA 5061
0414 157 974

NOW I'M NOT GOING TO LIE TO YOU, this was NOT an enjoyable dinner. It was anything but. My husband and I love good old fashioned Italian food. The real deal, authentic, basic, nothing fancy but just enough to transport you to the country and make you feel all warm and fuzzy. So for our 3rd wedding anniversary we thought we'd use the opportunity to have a beautiful dinner at a newer restaurant that, from what I had read, promised to serve old school Italian food.

From the moment we walked in I felt a sense of disappointment creeping in. Ambiance was completely lacking. In fairness, it was early in the evening so there weren't a lot of customers, however aside from this there was something about the whole place which felt somewhat sparse and cold. I did like the randomly placed pictures of pinocchio over the walls, it was just a pity the colour of paint on the walls was so depressing.

From here it continued to get worse. Two new waitresses had been placed on at the same time, which meant twice the mistakes and twice the frustration for us. I'd asked for a nice Italian wine and we received an Australian wine of the requested variety. When this mistake was corrected, the Italian bottle was slightly corked. When our glasses were filled up wine was spilt down the sides, and after the initial pour of water and wine we were left to top up our own glasses. The complementary olives were rancid and there was no plain crusty bread with our pasta meals or even on the menu for that matter. All the small touches you'd expect from a restaurant were missing and we were left with a series of mistakes that after a while became laughable.

Unfortunately the food was just an extension of the night we were having. Poor. Our entrees of Funghi Orvievtana (mushrooms with pancetta and cheese) and Voul au Vonts, were as basic as a Sunday evening whip up.

For the Main we had Tagliotini Scoglio (pasta with fresh seafood) and Tagliotini al Granchio (pasta with crabmeat). On a positive note the homemade pasta itself was good. Unfortunately it stopped there. My meal tasted like pasta with butter. There were a few nice pieces of fresh seafood however at no point did the flavour of the seafood impart into the rest of the pasta. It was bland, boring and a huge disappointment. The crab pasta was not much better. There was at least some flavour to it, however nothing on any other crab pasta I have eaten or made myself.

I could go on with more of the mistakes and stuff up's that went on in the short time we stayed for dinner however I think you get the picture. Being just a tad obsessed with food, I almost always enjoy eating it, even if its not all that good. On this occasion it was really hard to drag out anything positive from the whole experience which is such a disappointment and was totally unexpected. Final words... To keep my nose short; I do not recommend this restaurant.


The Eatery by CK





Tagliotini Scoglio



Funghi Orvievtana